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John Charles Julian Lennon (born 8 April 1963) is an English musician, songwriter, actor, and photographer. He is the son of John Lennon and Lennon's first wife, Cynthia Powell. Beatles manager Brian Epstein was his godfather. He has a younger half-brother, Sean Lennon. Lennon was named after his paternal grandmother, Julia. He remains close friends with his father's former bandmate Paul McCartney.
Julian directly inspired three Beatles songs, "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", "Hey Jude" and "Good Night". He is also devoted to philanthropic endeavors, most notably his own White Feather Foundation and the Whaledreamers Organization, both of which promote the co-existence of all species and the health and well-being of the Earth.
His sixth studio album Everything Changes was released on 3 October 2011.
Julian Lennon was born in Liverpool. Initially, the fact that John Lennon was married and had a child was concealed from the public, in keeping with the conventional wisdom of the era that female teenage fans would not be as enamoured of married male pop stars.
Lennon inspired one of his father's most famous songs, "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", whose lyrics describe a picture the boy had drawn, a watercolour painting of his friend Lucy O'Donnell from preschool surrounded by stars. Another composition of his father inspired by him was the lullaby "Good Night", the closing song of the "White Album". In 1967, Julian attended the set of The Beatles' film Magical Mystery Tour.
When he was five, Lennon's parents divorced, following his father's infidelity with Yoko Ono. Paul McCartney wrote "Hey Jude" to console him over the divorce; originally called "Hey Jules", McCartney changed the name because he thought "Jude" was an easier name to sing.
Lennon had almost no contact with his father after the divorce and until the early 1970s, when at the instigation of his father's then girlfriend May Pang Julian began to see his father more regularly. John bought his son a Gibson Les Paul guitar and a drum machine for Christmas in 1973, and encouraged his interest in music by showing him some chords.
He made his musical debut at age 11 on his father's album Walls and Bridges playing drums on "Ya-Ya", later saying, "Dad, had I known you were going to put it on the album, I would've played much better!"
Julian Lennon has had an inconsistent career as a musical artist. He enjoyed immediate success with his debut 1984 album Valotte. The album was produced by Phil Ramone. The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1985, and produced two top ten hits, the title track "Valotte", and "Too Late For Goodbyes". Lennon promoted the album with music videos for the two hits made by movie director Sam Peckinpah and producer Martin Lewis. The song "Valotte" has remained a staple on adult contemporary radio stations since its release. After the release, Paul McCartney sent him a telegram wishing him good luck. Later that year, the two met up backstage at the New York studios of the TV show Friday Night Videos.
His second album, 1986's The Secret Value of Daydreaming was panned by critics, but reached number 32 on the Billboard Magazine's album chart, and produced the single "Stick Around", which was his first #1 single on the U.S. Album Rock Tracks chart. He recorded the song "Because", which was made famous by The Dave Clark Five, in the UK for Clark's 1986 musical, Time (the single is out of print). Lennon never reached the same level of success in the U.S. post-Valotte, but he hit number five in Australia with the 1989 single "Now You're In Heaven", which also gave him his second #1 hit on the Album Rock Tracks chart in the USA.
In 1991, George Harrison played on Lennon's album Help Yourself but was not directly credited. A song off the album, "Saltwater", reached number six in the UK and topped the Australian singles charts for four weeks. Also during this time he contributed a cover of the Rolling Stones' "Ruby Tuesday" to the soundtrack of the television series The Wonder Years. After 1991, Lennon left the music business for several years. He followed his interests in cooking, sailing, and sculpting during his leave from the music industry.
After he began his performing career there was occasionally unfounded media speculation that Julian would undertake performances with Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. However, in the Beatles Anthology series in 1996, the three surviving Beatles confirmed that there was never an idea of having Julian sit in for his father as part of a Beatles reunion, with McCartney saying "why would we want to subject him to all of this?"
In May 1998, Lennon released the album Photograph Smile to little commercial success. In 2002, he recorded a version of the Beatles' classic "When I'm Sixty-Four", a song from Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, for an Allstate Insurance commercial.
In 2006 he ventured into Internet businesses, including MyStore.com with Todd Meagher and Bebo founder Michael Birch.
In 2009 Lennon created a new partnership with Todd Meagher and Micheal Birch called theRevolution, LLC. Through this company, Lennon released a tribute song and EP, "Lucy", honoring the memory of Lucy Vodden, the little girl who inspired the song Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, with 50% of the proceeds going to fund Lupus research.
Julian Lennon has released a new album called Everything Changes on 3 October 2011.
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